West Virginia Public News Service and Hampshire Review - State lawmakers are struggling to close a big budget hole, but a close look shows the legislature dug that pit with business tax cuts over the last eight years. Read Sean O'Leary with the West Virginia Center on Budget & Policy pointed out that state spending…
WVCBP in the News
West Virginia Public Broadcasting - An update on Governor Tomblin's legislative agenda and members of the Senate Government Organization Committee discuss a House bill that would reform the state Ethics Commission and reduce the number of members it requires. House committees discuss bills from the Senate, including the Future Fund and pay raises for teachers.…
The State Journal - Creating a Future Fund for the state has been on the minds of many West Virginia officials for the last several years, but this year it might become a reality. Read The Future Fund, Senate Bill 461, sponsored by West Virginia Senate President Jeff Kessler, D-Marshall, along with 31 of the…
The State Journal - Ted Boettner, executive director of the West Virginia Center on Budget and Policy, has helped work on a Future Fund bill for the state for the past three years, promoting it as a way for the state to turn one-time revenue into a permanent source of wealth for West Virginia. Read…
Charleston Gazette - Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., gathered a group of people Friday who joined him in talking about the importance of government social programs that can be used to help working people. Read Rockefeller was a leading advocate for the Children's Health Insurance Program, which has provided health care for more than 8 million…
West Virginia Public News Service – A new report on income growth shows West Virginians have seen theirs expand by 13 percent since 1979, but more than half of it went to the very wealthiest. Read The report by the Economic Policy Institute found that when the statistics are examined by income level, the top…
Charleston Gazette - More than half of West Virginians' income growth over the past three decades went to the state's top 1 percent of taxpayers -- one of the highest rates of unequal income growth in the nation, according to a report released Wednesday. Read The report -- "The Increasingly Unequal States of America: Income…
Charleston Gazette - Citing financial problems, three Kanawha County daycare facilities will close next month. Read The West Virginia Public Employees Daycare, the Shawnee Daycare and the Elk Center Daycare announced Tuesday they will end services by March 28 or sooner. The daycare centers, which currently serve 120 students and have 40 people on staff,…
Charleston Gazette - Officials with the "Our Children, Our Future" campaign plan to press lawmakers to protect funding for family support programs and to expand in-home family education and early childhood development programs in an effort to help end child poverty. Read The campaign's platform also includes increasing the minimum wage and the Earned Income…
Charleston Daily Mail - House lawmakers passed a measure Wednesday increasing West Virginia's hourly minimum wage from $7.25 to $8.75 by the start of 2016. Read Close to a dozen delegates spoke before the House overwhelmingly approved the measures. Amidst smiles and laughter, delegates passed the bill by a margin of 89 to five. Six…